reflectapi is a library and a toolkit for writing web API services in Rust and generating compatible clients, delivering great development experience and efficiency.
Features
- Code-first definition of services with API over HTTP
- 100% compatible type-safe and extensible clients delivering same simplicity and intent of the server API
- Multi-language client generation:
- TypeScript - stable
- Rust - stable
- Python - experimental
- Documentation rendering using Redoc tool
- Web framework agnostic with plugable Axum support included, other frameworks are possible
- Full support for all serde attributes
- Full enablement for all Rust types, including standard library, common popular crates and adding support for 3rd party and custom types is straightforward
Documentation
- Crates.io - Package information and versions
- API Documentation - Complete API reference
- User Guide - Tutorials and examples (build locally with
mdbook serveindocs/) - Architecture - System design and internals
Development notes
Building and running
Ensure that you have prettier, rustfmt, and ruff available in your PATH for consistently formatted generated code.
To run the demo server:
cargo run --bin reflectapi-demo
To generate client in Typescript for demo server:
cargo run --bin reflectapi -- codegen --language typescript --schema reflectapi-demo/reflectapi.json --output reflectapi-demo/clients/typescript
To run the Typescript generated client. Note: requires the demo server running
cd reflectapi-demo/clients/typescript/
npm install
npm run start
To generate client in Rust for demo server:
cargo run --bin reflectapi -- codegen --language rust --schema reflectapi-demo/reflectapi.json --output reflectapi-demo/clients/rust/generated/src/
To run the Rust generated client. Note: requires the demo server running
cd reflectapi-demo/clients/rust/
cargo run --all-features
To generate client in Python for demo server:
cargo run --bin reflectapi -- codegen --language python --schema reflectapi-demo/reflectapi.json --output reflectapi-demo/clients/python
Updating Snapshots
This project uses insta for snapshot testing to ensure code generation output is correct and stable. When tests fail due to snapshot mismatches:
- Review the changes first to ensure they are expected
- Update snapshots using one of these commands:
# Interactive review (recommended)
# Auto-accept all changes (use with caution)
- Re-run tests to verify they pass:
Building Documentation
# Install required tools (one-time setup)
# Build documentation
# Serve documentation locally
# Note: mdbook-keeper automatically runs doctests during build
# The build command both generates HTML and tests code examples
Releasing
Pushing a v* tag triggers .github/workflows/release.yml, which:
- Verifies every package version matches the tag (
packaging.versionparses both Cargo SemVer and PEP 440 forms so the same tag covers both ecosystems). - Publishes the four Rust crates to crates.io in dependency order —
reflectapi-schema→reflectapi-derive→reflectapi→reflectapi-cli— using crates.io Trusted Publishing (OIDC, noCARGO_REGISTRY_TOKENsecret). - Builds the pure-Python
reflectapi-runtimeand publishes to PyPI via Trusted Publishing. - Cuts a GitHub Release with auto-generated notes; tags containing
alpha,beta, orrcare flagged as pre-releases automatically.
Both publishers run inside the release GitHub Environment, which is configured as a trusted publisher on each crate (crates.io) and on the reflectapi-runtime PyPI project.
To cut a release, bump every version in lockstep and push the matching tag. The Cargo files use SemVer (0.18.0-alpha.1), reflectapi-python-runtime/pyproject.toml and src/reflectapi_runtime/__init__.py use PEP 440 (0.18.0a1):
# 1. Bump Cargo SemVer in all four crates.
cargo release \
--exclude reflectapi-demo \
--exclude reflectapi-demo-client \
--exclude reflectapi-demo-client-generated \
minor --execute --no-publish --no-tag
# 2. Bump the Python runtime (PEP 440 form) by hand:
# reflectapi-python-runtime/pyproject.toml version = "..."
# reflectapi-python-runtime/src/reflectapi_runtime/__init__.py __version__ = "..."
# 3. Commit, tag, push:
git commit -am "chore: <version>"
git tag v<version> # the `v` prefix is required
git push origin main v<version>
For pre-releases use --prerelease alpha (or beta / rc) on cargo release; the Python equivalent is 0.18.0a1, 0.18.0b1, 0.18.0rc1.